VA Unconstitutionally Tries To Disarm Veterans

Guns: Veterans who bore arms to defend their country are receiving letters that they may be declared mentally incompetent and have their Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms stripped from them. Welcome home.

The contempt by the Obama administration for our Constitution and our rights has reached a new low with news the Veterans Administration has begun sending letters to veterans telling them they will be declared mentally incompetent and stripped of the Second Amendment rights unless they can prove to unnamed bureaucrats to the contrary.

On Thursday, Michael Connelly, executive director of the United States Justice Foundation, said veterans have begun getting warning letters from the Veterans Administration (VA). The letters inform the recipients that he or she must provide evidence to the contrary within 60 days. If the veteran desires a hearing, they must inform the VA within 30 days.

"A determination of incompetency will prohibit you from purchasing, possessing, receiving, or transporting a firearm or ammunition. If you knowingly violate any of these prohibitions, you may be fined, imprisoned, or both pursuant to the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, Pub.L.No. 103-159, as implemented at 18, United States Code 924(a)(2)," the letter reads.

The VA states on its Fiduciary Program website that, according to the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, signed into law in 1993, being determined as unable to manage your benefits prevents you from owning and possessing a firearm or ammunition.

While mental health is a factor in the current gun control debate and recent mass shootings in Newtown, Conn., and Aurora, Colo., and elsewhere have in common the questionable mental state of the shooters, to single out returning vets from Iraq and Afghanistan this way is unconscionable and unconstitutional.

No one wants the mentally unstable to possess firearms, but neither do we want to see the presumption of innocence or the right to due process guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution taken away. The Fifth Amendment states that no person shall "... be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law." The VA seems to be violating these rights to take away those guaranteed under the Second Amendment.

Returning vets were seen as vulnerable to "right-wing extremists" in an April 2009 report by Janet Napolitano's Homeland Security Dept., titled "Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment".

"Returning veterans possess combat skills and experience that are attractive to right-wing extremists," it says. "(Department of Homeland Security's Office of Intelligence and Analysis) is concerned that right-wing extremists will attempt to recruit and radicalize veterans in order to boost their violent capacities."

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